gospel-centered experiential theology

Menu

Universe

I’m not a scientist. My science classes in college were geology, meteorology, and food science. The best I did in high school was a B in honors physics at a public school. And even that grade should be investigated.

So allow my non-scientific mind to think through something with you.

Often in debates about evolution and creation, I hear people argue for evolution (that is, the origin of the universe via big-bang) by saying, “Science proves it. Science is not faith, it’s fact.” They do this by talking about carbon dating, fossils, and the fact that Noah couldn’t really have had all those animals in the ark.

Well, science is “fact” if you are talking about how a tree grows, how a car moves, or how my heart works. You can prove those things. But science cannot prove the origin of the universe. “Yes it can!” people tell me.

No. It can’t.

Why? When we refer to science, we usually mean “systematic knowledge of the physical or material world gained through observation and experimentation.” We come to this knowledge of the physical world by using the scientific method, which Merriam-Webster defines as “principles and procedures for the systematic pursuit of knowledge involving the recognition and formulation of a problem, the collection of data through observation and experiment, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses.”

You cannot re-create a universe as vast, complex, organized, and beautiful as ours in a test tube in order to collect data about how it began. It just can’t happen.

So if you hold that the origin of the universe is due to a randomized explosion of atomic particles, that’s fine by me. Just don’t call it science. Call it what it is: faith, belief, and religion.

This morning I read about Jesus feeding the five thousand and walking on water from Mark 6. The disciples didn’t understand. In fact, Mark says that their hearts were hardened. What the disciples didn’t get was the fact that the God who created water, fish, bread, and the world was sitting and talking with them.

Then I began to think about molecules, atoms, protons, neutrons, electrons and the like. I’m not scientific at all, but when you let your mind wander into the vast complexities of these invisible structures that make up the universe, you don’t feel important anymore. Actually, I would argue that it’s impossible to think about such things and feel significant in yourself.

But I didn’t feel this way because of the atoms or protons themselves. It’s ultimately the result of knowing and loving the infinite God who, with a single word, created those things and everything else — including me — in the universe.

While worshiping the Lord this morning, I was reflecting on the idea of being like God. It was one of the factors of Adam and Eve’s first sin. “You will be like God,” the serpent said. The fact is, though, that we already were like God. He made us in his image. Now, we seek to make ourselves our own God. However, if you are born again and have a new spirit, a new heart, a new mind, and a new will, you want to become more like Christ and less like yourself. We call this sanctification.

So, I thought about my asking God to give me grace to “be like Jesus.” Then, I thought about meeting Jesus face to face for the first time. He will look at me and say, “Behold, I am making all things new” (Rev. 21:5). And on that day, I will begin the final process of becoming like him.

But, I began to think about the size of God. People say, “We serve a huge God!” No we don’t. We don’t even serve a big God. Galaxies are huge. Planets are big. God is unsizeable. He holds the galaxies in the tip of his finger. First Kings 8:27 says, “But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you; how much less this house that I have built!” God is not bound by time or space. He is holy and his holiness is manifested in his glory. That glory will be unpacked for eternity in heaven. We will never see the end of it. And for us, those who are being “transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another,” it will take an eternity to become like the greatest manifestation of his glory, namely Jesus. In other words, it will never, ever, ever happen.

Let the weight of that sink into your heart. God is altogether infinitely higher and loftier then we are. It will take forever for us to become like him. In other words, it will never, ever, ever happen.